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Senior Dorm will be built - The Promise

Wed, 11/29/2017 - 12:31pmVic MacDonald

By:

Vic MacDonald/Editor

We will be repurposing some facilities and relocating offices in others to provide a more seamless campus life experience, and we are configuring residence halls to offer more opportunities for single facilities.” - PC President Bob Staton

Presbyterian College plans to built dorms - The Promise part 2, related editorial under Opinions this website

After meetings with the faculty, more details are emerging about a PC strategic plan that will make radical changes to football and free up scholarship money for other programs, including building living quarters for seniors.

The Promise of PC was unveiled to faculty Nov. 20, after approval by the Board of Trustees Nov. 8 and 9. It is not a matter that is up for debate; the board’s approval sends the plan forward for Presbyterian College.

More faculty meetings were held Tuesday and will be held Thursday, according to a posting on the private Facebook group, On, On PC!

In a statement to the faculty Nov. 20, President Bob Staton said, “Our most exciting initiative regarding the physical space is to construct three new, apartment-style buildings with a total of 144 beds for our seniors near the heart of campus.

“We believe this is essential to maximizing the spirit of community we know embodies The Promise of PC for students, faculty, and staff. In adding these residential facilities, we will also transform Springs Student Center by offering more space for recreation, meetings, and events, and we will be developing new individual and group study spaces throughout the heart of campus. We will be repurposing some facilities and relocating offices in others to provide a more seamless campus life experience, and we are configuring residence halls to offer more opportunities for single facilities.”

Details about how and when, and how payment will be made for, new construction on the 240-acre campus will begin have yet to be ironed out and announced.

Staton’s statement also said, “The PC you will see in 2020 will look quite different from what you see now – all with the intent to support The Promise of PC. ... While our Facilities Master Plan will not be finalized until early next year, we are excited about the potential these options give us for future growth and expansion across both undergraduate and graduate programs. I believe The Promise of PC is essential in today’s higher education marketplace, and it is vital that we share that promise in ways that engage different individuals and groups and excite them about what PC has to offer.”

In The Promise of PC, the college also has plans to beef up its website to engage with audiences about Presbyterian College moving forward. Staton’s statement said, “We are developing profiles of the best examples of that promise – students, faculty, and staff – to highlight with news stories, videos, social media posts and other communications channels. We are expanding capacity in marketing and communications, and we are coordinating this work in order to recruit new students, reach out to alumni, and reconnect with friends and those who wonder why they may not have heard about The Promise of PC before.

“We are also connecting with people who want to help us realize The Promise of PC for the next generation of students. We are continuing our foundational relationships with the Presbyterian Church, USA, and our covenant partnership with the Synod of the South Atlantic is something we are confident will always be a source of strength and support for PC. We plan to hold meetings across the Southeast over the next several months to share how alumni and friends may share PC’s promise within their individual and group networks. We are also studying how to implement a capital campaign that expands The Promise of PC throughout all our initiatives.”

Staton’s statement said the strategic plan is the result of 18 months of work by 500 people connected with PC. But a posting on On, On PC! said that 500 could include faculty and coaches who were instructed to come to a team-building meeting at the start of the 2016-17 school year. At that meeting, there was discussion of the need for a strategic plan, and people were divided into teams - but each team worked independently on specific topics.

The faculty was never fully apprised that The Promise of PC would mean eliminating scholarships for football players, this posting said. For people to say otherwise is “disrespectful,” this posting said.

To that end, by 2020, no athletic aid will be provided for football players as PC joins the NCAA Division I Pioneer League, a group of schools that have football teams but do not provide athletic aid for these athletes.

Football players, under this arrangement, can qualify for academic scholarships.

PC plans to add club level sports and competition in bass fishing, wrestling, and acrobatics-competitive cheerleading. Critics of the move to The Pioneer League said PC is taking a money-making athletic program with a tradition of more than 100 years, and turning it into a “club sport,” accessible mostly by white, upper-class students.